Comparison

The 4 Best Tools to Share Your Google Calendar Availability as Text (2026)

Last updated: August 2026 · Pricing and free-plan terms verified against each vendor's own pricing page in August 2026 — check their sites before buying, as these change.
Full disclosure: we make Offer Times, one of the tools below. We've kept the comparison honest — including where competitors are the better pick.

You need to propose meeting times. You could send a scheduling link — but for interviews, client outreach, or anyone senior to you, a "book me" link can feel impersonal, like handing someone a ticket machine. The alternative most professionals actually use: typing out their availability by hand, double-checking timezones, and hoping they didn't fat-finger a Tuesday.

There's a middle path: tools that let you select open slots on your calendar and copy them as clean, ready-to-send text. You stay in control of the conversation; the other person just replies to an email. Here are the four worth considering, compared honestly — plus a note on when a booking link beats all of them.

Quick comparison

1. Offer Times — the lightest option, and the cheapest that supports Outlook

How it works: A small launcher appears in the corner of Google Calendar or Outlook on the web. Click it, select your open slots directly on the calendar grid, preview the formatted text, and copy. Paste into email, Slack, LinkedIn — anywhere.

Where it stands out:

• A real free plan. 4 availability copies per month, no trial countdown, no credit card. If you schedule occasionally, you may never pay. (The first 3 are usable without an account; after that you'll sign in.)
• Outlook on the web support. Slot2Text and Sundial are Google Calendar only. Vimcal supports Outlook too, but starts at four times the price — so if your company lives in Microsoft 365, this is the cheapest way to get availability-as-text.
• Nothing new to adopt. It runs inside the calendar you already use, rather than asking you to move into a separate calendar app (the Vimcal trade-off, below).
• Plain text, not a disguised link. What you copy is exactly what your recipient reads — no embedded booking link behind the times. That matters when a link is the thing you were trying to avoid.
• Multi-timezone output. Show times in your zone, theirs, or up to four at once ("Tue, Aug 4: 2–3pm ET / 11am–12pm PT"), which removes the most common scheduling error entirely. Timezones are searchable by city, so you can type "boston" rather than hunting for America/New_York.
• Available in 50 languages. The interface and the availability text it produces are both localized, which matters if you schedule across regions or your recipients don't read English.
• Works inside Gmail's side panel, so you can grab availability without leaving the email you're replying to.
• Slot holds let you mark tentatively-offered times on your calendar while you wait for a reply, so you don't double-offer the same slot to two people.

Where it's weaker: Unlimited is a paid tier ($5/month), and there's no desktop-Outlook or Apple Calendar support. Power features like calendar auditing (see Sundial) aren't the focus.

Best for: Recruiters, executive assistants, founders, and client-facing professionals who want scheduling to stay personal — especially anyone who touches Outlook.

2. Vimcal — the most polished take, if you'll switch calendar apps

Vimcal is the strongest competitor here, and it's worth being blunt about that. Its flagship feature, Slots, is precisely this category: press A, drag across open times on your calendar, and Vimcal formats them as text for you to copy. It's fast, keyboard-driven, and very well built.

Where it stands out:

• Speed and polish. Vimcal is built around keyboard shortcuts and sub-100ms interactions — it's marketed as "Superhuman for calendar" and largely earns it.
• Best-in-class timezone handling. "Time Travel" shows up to five timezones at once, and proposed times auto-convert to each recipient's zone.
• Google and Outlook, in one unified view if you use both.
• Self-destructing holds. Holds are created when you send times and clean themselves up once one is booked — the most elegant implementation of this on the list.
• Free Time Finder works in reverse: paste someone else's availability — text, a screenshot, even a Calendly link — and Vimcal overlays it on your calendar.

Where it's weaker: Two things. First, price — $20/month for individuals ($16.67 billed annually), and the EA tier is $75/month ($62.50 annually). The free plan is real but iOS-only, so on a laptop you're on a 14-day trial and then paying. Second, and more fundamental: Vimcal is a calendar client. It layers over Google or Outlook rather than replacing them, but you're still moving your daily scheduling into a new app. If you just want to copy a few times out of the Google Calendar tab you already have open, that's a big adoption ask.

One nuance worth knowing: Vimcal's Slots output deliberately blends both models — the times you paste are human-readable and clickable, backed by a booking link. Vimcal pitches this as the best of both worlds, and often it is. But if you're reaching for availability-as-text specifically because you don't want a booking link in the message, that's a real difference in philosophy.

Best for: Founders, executives, and EAs who schedule constantly, want a genuinely better calendar, and can justify the subscription.

3. Slot2Text — solid Google Calendar option, but no free plan

Slot2Text takes a similar approach: highlight free slots in Google Calendar, convert them to shareable text. It supports several date formats (US, EU, UK, ISO, Brazilian, and custom), which is handy for international correspondence.

Where it stands out: Clean, focused execution for Google Calendar users, and the cheapest paid entry point in this comparison if you bill annually.

Where it's weaker: There's no free plan — you get a 7-day trial, then it's a paid subscription ($2.99/month billed annually, $3.99 monthly for the Base tier). Timezone conversion isn't in Base at all; it requires the Pro tier ($3.99 annual / $4.99 monthly). The terms are strict: all payments are final, with no refunds for partial periods. It's Google Calendar only, with no Outlook support.

Best for: Google-Calendar-only users who know they'll use it daily and don't need to try before committing long-term.

4. Sundial — the power-scheduler suite (with a price to match)

Sundial is the most feature-rich tool here, aimed at people whose job is scheduling. Beyond copying availability as text, it adds multiple named timezones to your calendar view, overlays proposed meeting times visually on your calendar, manages holds in bulk, and can export your events to a Google Sheet for a calendar audit.

Where it stands out: Breadth, and genuine credibility — it's SOC 2 Type II attested and used by EA teams at large tech companies. For an EA managing several executives across timezones, the overlay and audit features are meaningfully differentiated.

Where it's weaker: Price, by an order of magnitude. Paid plans are $39/seat/month (Core) and $49/seat/month (EA Scheduler) — roughly eight to ten times the other dedicated tools here. The free plan is credit-based (100 credits/month, with most actions costing a credit), so it functions as an extended trial rather than a sustainable free tier. Several headline features — bulk holds, calendar audit export, polls, workspaces — are gated to the $49 EA Scheduler tier. It also requires an email sign-up and is Google Calendar only. If all you want is "copy my availability as text," it's a lot of surface area, and a lot of money, for one feature.

Best for: Full-time power schedulers who will use the whole toolkit and can expense it.

When a booking link is actually the right call

Calendly isn't on the list above, because it doesn't do what these tools do — it sends a link instead of text. But it's worth saying plainly: sometimes a link is the correct answer, and pretending otherwise would be dishonest.

If you're scheduling at volume with people who expect to self-serve — sales demos, support calls, office hours, inbound leads — a booking link is the right tool, and Calendly is excellent at it. Asking fifty prospects to email you back with times would be worse for everyone, including them.

The tools above exist for the other half of scheduling: conversations where you're building a relationship, reaching up, or simply being a person. "Would Tuesday at 2 or Wednesday morning work?" lands differently than a link and a menu.

If you do want a link, two things are worth knowing about Calendly specifically. Its free plan is real but narrow — one event type and one connected calendar. And "works with your calendar" means Google, Outlook/Office 365, and Exchange; iCloud has been closed to new connections since August 2024. Paid starts at $10/seat/month billed annually, with lead routing on the $16 Teams tier and Stripe/PayPal payments on Standard.

Most people we talk to end up using both: a booking link for inbound volume, and an availability-as-text tool for everything that deserves a human touch.

Which one should you pick?

• You want to start free, or you want the cheapest Outlook option: Offer Times.
• You want the best version of this and will change calendar apps to get it: Vimcal — provided $20/month (or $75 for the EA tier) is easy for you to justify.
• You're Google-only, high-volume, and happy to subscribe from day one: Slot2Text is the cheapest paid option — just note timezone conversion needs the Pro tier.
• Scheduling is your full-time job and you want the kitchen sink: Sundial, if you can expense $39–49/seat/month.
• You're scheduling strangers at scale: keep your Calendly — and pair it with one of the above for the emails that matter.

FAQ

How do I copy my availability from Google Calendar as text?

Without an extension: open your calendar, note your open slots, and type them out manually — including timezone conversions if your recipient is elsewhere. With a tool like Offer Times, you select the open slots directly on the calendar grid and copy pre-formatted text in one click, with timezones converted automatically.

Is there a free alternative to Calendly that doesn't use booking links?

Yes. Offer Times has a free plan (4 copies per month, Google Calendar and Outlook on the web), and Sundial offers a credit-based free tier for Google Calendar. Vimcal's free plan is iOS-only, so it won't help on a laptop. Slot2Text is trial-only and requires a subscription once the trial ends.

Can I share Outlook availability as text?

Two tools here do it: Offer Times (Outlook on the web, from free) and Vimcal (Outlook and Google, from $20/month). Slot2Text and Sundial are Google Calendar only. Note that Offer Times supports Outlook on the web, not the Outlook desktop app.

Why share availability as text instead of a scheduling link?

Response rates and tone. A short list of concrete times reads as a personal note and can be answered inline with "Tuesday works." A booking link asks the other person to leave the conversation and do process work — fine for self-serve volume, riskier for interviews, clients, and anyone whose time you're courting.